Denali National Park 6-22-2010

Wolf on the hunt.

Mama Grizzly looking back for her babies.

The little one on the right was always doing it's own thing. We could never get a pictures with all 3 close together.

Dall Sheep. Don't you think they look like a Mountain Goat?

This little guy is the squirrel that hibernates and his body temp. falls below freezing.

Denali National Park was one of those "you just have to do it" stops. As with all National Parks it was very "touristy" with lots of people from around the world. I think all National Parks in the US use a bus systems to transport humans into the interior of the parks in order to keep the Eco system as natural as possible. This park was no different. We signed up for the 8 hour bus tour. There were 10 and 12 hour tours but we thought 8 hours would be our limit. We didn't know what to expect. Would the bus be jammed stem to stern and everyone would have to clamber over each other when and if we spotted one of the many animals we were all there hoping to see? Each bus held about 60 passengers. Because we were staying in a campground 12 miles inside the park the bus would pick us up 30 minutes after everyone else. We wondered if the bus would be fill up at the visitors center. We were pleasantly surprised when the bus showed up with more than 2 empty seats. Upon entering the bus I told everyone "It was nice of you to join us today", no response, except from the bus driver, he chuckled a little. So. I just smiled and we got on took our seats. Hehehehe The first 45 minutes were uneventful. We did not see anything except human animals working along the roadway. There were actually some young people walking along the road concentrating on the shoulder of the road. The driver said it was their job to look for unnatural plants that had been brought in to the park as seeds in the wheels of vehicles. How would you like that job? At our first stop, made so we could get out stretch our legs and use the outhouses, we saw our first animal. It was a Dall Sheep. These look like a mountain goat but are snow white. That is the only reason it was spotted. And Chip was the one who did. It was really far away on a mountain side but stood out because of its white coat against the dark chocolate brown of the mountain. Yay, we are off to a nice start. Did you know the Dall Sheep is the reason Denali became a national park? It would be another 30 minutes or so before we would see our first Caribou. Did you know a Caribou and a Reindeer are the same animal? These were spotted on patches of snow way up on the hillside. I am sure the people on the bus without binoculars were kicking themselves for not buying some or bringing theirs. As we continued there were several times, as you can imagine where buses have to pass each other going opposite directions. I was praying that we would not be in that situation on one stretch of the road where it appeared there was just enough room for one bus, no guard rail and a 1500 foot drop off. Before the day was over we were blessed with the sightings of 6 Grizzly bears (1 lone male sleeping in the grass, a Mama with 1 teenage cub, a Mama with 2 spring cubs), 3 wolves (we actually saw one pounce on some small animal, probably a rodent and eat it), a magpie (that was following the wolf for scraps), a couple of immature bald eagles, snowshoe rabbits and a couple harrier hawks. Oh and a little squirrel that we learned hibernates every winter and its body temperature falls below freezing. How is that possible? Nature, isn't it a wonderful and amazing thing! For all our fretting over sitting on a bus for 8 hours, the day went by too fast and it was amazing.